


Untitled

by teenagewristband



Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Kink Meme, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-17
Updated: 2014-09-17
Packaged: 2018-02-17 16:15:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2315669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teenagewristband/pseuds/teenagewristband
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nick goes to pick Monroe up for their first date, but Monroe is nowhere to be found.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Untitled

**Author's Note:**

> Written to fill this prompt - Monroe suddenly disappears. His house is untouched, like he just went for a walk, except for the small drop of blood on the back door. How does Nick react and how does he find him? 
> 
> http://grimm-kink.dreamwidth.org/1735.html?thread=2247#cmt2247

It's not like he hasn't picked Monroe up at his house many times before. This time shouldn't be any different, but it is. There is no pretense of wesen or police business. This is just them, the two of them blutbad and grimm going out on a formally declared date. It is a little weird and also inevitable so there's no good reason for Nick to be stalling in his car. He's checked his teeth in the rearview to make sure there was no leftover lunch, combed his fingers through his hair, straightened his shirt, but he hasn't turned off the engine. He kind of hopes maybe Monroe will meet him halfway on the lawn, to make it less of a deal. But it is. He's kind of into the blutbad to a ridiculous degree. Fortunately, his relationship with Juliette died its own death as a result of his grimm activities. He had never found the courage to tell her and she'd grown tired of his secrecy and unexplained disappearances.

The lights are on downstairs, but he doesn't see any movement behind the curtains. The image of Monroe upstairs stymied about which sweater vest to wear makes Nick smile. It's not like he didn't have his own mini-sartorial freakout. And of the people he knows he couldn't exactly ask them for help. Hank pretty much wore whatever his various wives bought for him during their marriages and he has no idea Nick and Monroe have spoken to each other beyond the initial investigation that brought them together. That's not a conversation he's prepared to have. He's seen Wu dressed in civvies on more than one occasion and though the man has great personal style, he'd be like a dog with a bone trying to figure out why Nick was asking for that particular advice. Renard is beyond out of the question. Nick knows from Juliette and others that people consider his eyes his best feature so he'd known enough to buy a shirt that 'made his eyes pop'. Nick wants Monroe to look at him in his newly purchased v-neck aquamarine henley, fresh from J.Crew, and let go of any doubts he might have about Nick's sincerity. But that's not going to happen if Nick doesn't get out of his car.

When there is no answer to his knock or ringing of the doorbell, he lets himself in with his key. It's possible the blutbad lost track of time and is still in the shower. Sure, letting yourself into a date's house is not the normal first date protocol, but because of grimm business they've had no choice but to do some things backwards, out of order. So he has a key to Monroe's house. The blutbad has a key to his. It's not the first time that he's used it. Nick only takes one step over the threshold and listens. Listens for the sound of Monroe moving around in the kitchen. Inhales for the scent of something freshly ground or chopped, but the first floor is quiet and smells faintly of Febreze. The grimm steps fully into the house closing the door behind him. Listens for the creak of floorboards above him. For the sound of water churning through old pipes. There is nothing. The house sounds empty. Despite all the clocks, it isn't like Monroe has never lost track of time while deep into a repair or a piece on the cello. For just a moment, a spike of insecurity hits the grimm. He hadn't been able to think about much of anything for the last couple of days except the date, about how much he wanted it to go well, but maybe it wasn't in the forefront of Monroe's brain like it was his.

Nick heads upstairs to see if maybe the blutbad is taking a nap when he realizes the living room, which is usually pretty toasty, is drafty. The toastiness and Monroe's comfortable couch have lulled Nick to sleep on more than one occasion after a long shift. All the windows in the living room are closed so they aren't the source. There is a window in the kitchen that might be the source which means Monroe has probably lost track of time. He wouldn't go anywhere and leave his windows open. In the kitchen everything is in it's proper place, tidy the way Monroe likes it, the window over the sink cranked open. Nick smiles as he cranks the window closed. One less thing Monroe will have to do before they head out on their evening .The source of the draft dealt with, Nick bounds up the stairs two at a time.

“Monroe, come on man we're gonna be late for our reservation.”

Nothing too fancy. Nick had made a reservation at Real Food Daily, a newly opened vegan restaurant in Portland, still new enough and shiny enough that they they'd required reservations to manage the rush. He'd listened to Monroe complain for a week about the whole principle of having to make a reservation, since it wasn't required at the California flagship. Nick had called in a favor to get in, but if they missed the time, they'd have to waitlist like everyone else. “Monroe, come on. Wake up.” At the top of the stairs, the grimm stands still, listens to the sound of silence. Relative silence. The faucet in the bathroom needs a new washer and he can hear it dripping. The only other sounds are the boards that creak under his feet as he makes his way to Monroe's bedroom. Reflex sends his hand to his holstered weapon.

  
Monroe's bedroom and guest room are both empty. Tidy and empty. The faint trace of Monroe's cologne lingers in the air, but otherwise... _Monroe_. Nick lifts his voice to a shout. He doubts after all this time there are any nooks or crannies in this house that he is unaware of, but he calls out for Monroe one more time. No answer.

Pulling out his cell again, Nick dials. It goes to the blutbad's voicemail. Scrolling, he finds the number for the place where Monroe does Pilates. The receptionist who flirted so hard with Nick when he picked Monroe up there once that he couldn't help blushing like a kid, says that she hasn't seen Monroe all day. Moments like this it kind of sucks being a cop and a grimm. He could ignore the cop instinct, tamp it down, but then the grimm instinct doubles down making them both hard to ignore. It feels wrong that Monroe would run an errand before their date and not say anything, not text or call. It feels wrong that there was no note on the door. Nick heads for the stairs.

In the living room again, Nick surveys, not like a guy whose date lost track of time, but like a cop. Everything looks the same as it did two days ago when he'd stopped by to pick up a German translation from the blutbad. Everything in the living room was just as it should be. Walking briskly to the kitchen, Nick stops in the center of the room, breathes, looks around. Like the living room, even with a closer look nothing appears out of the ordinary. The detective checks his watch. Fifteen minutes since he let himself into Monroe's house. He reaches for his phone again, dials. While he listens to Monroe's ring roll over to voicemail again, he considers checking the backyard. Except, if Monroe were out there, he would have heard Nick's car. Even as he's thinking Monroe certainly would have heard him, smelled him in the kitchen, he takes a step toward the backdoor.

 

###

Hank's personal vehicle pulls in behind the crime scene van and parks. Nick hasn't called him and for a split second he feels disoriented. He's been watching out the window in case Monroe walks up so he can explain why there's a forensic van in front of his house. Seeing Hank throws him off. He hadn't exactly mentioned that he'd kept in touch with Monroe. There wasn't really a good explanation for their continued contact. Not without spilling the beans. It was easier to lie by omission to Hank than it was to Juliette, but now his worlds are about to collide in a way he hadn't expected. He needs to stop that from happening.

“Hey, Hank.” Nick meets his partner on the porch. “What's up?”

“You tell me man. I stopped in to check on some fingerprints and Doug passed me on the way out. Said you'd called in a favor.”

That was true. The eisbiber in the kitchen did owe him. Nick hadn't wanted to raise any unnecessary alarms in case Monroe was on a housecall that ran long or there was some other explanation that made sense. But a half hour ago when he'd reached for the back doorknob, there had been blood. Not a lot, barely any by most standards, but in the fastidiousness of Monroe's house and kitchen it stood out. Nick's hand had hovered for a few seconds with Monroe's voicemail playing in his ear. His instincts were too loud to ignore any longer so he'd called in and made an unofficial request.

“So what's up, this guy finally do something we can do something about.” Disgust flickers across Hank's face. It's like a slap to Nick. He and Monroe have become more than the cop and potential perp from the case that put them in each other's orbit. But Hank's only experience with the blutbad is as a suspect, a perp yet to be matched to a crime.

The lie comes easy, for everyone's protection, just like all of his lies since the grimm business began.

“He's uh helping me out with a couple things.” That earns him a raised eyebrow.

Like a CI.”

“Yeah,” Nick lies. “Like a CI, we were supposed to meet, but uh something was a little hinky so I'm just trying to get a read. I haven't registered him yet, still off the books.”

“Yeah? Hinky how?” Hank glances over Nick's shoulder and shifts slightly like he's going to make a move toward Monroe's front door. Nick can't allow that, not just because it would probably freak Monroe out to know Hank was in his house again, but because then it's a little more real. Then it's not just a hunch Nick is playing. Then the blutbad's house is a crime scene.

“I don't want to make too much of a deal about it. I'm just playing a hunch.”

“You need me to do anything?”

“No, I'll keep you posted if something pans out.” The grimm is not sure his partner believes him, but Hank smiles and steps off the porch. “Take it easy partner, I'll see you in a couple of days.” Nick manages to return the smile, make it easy, casual.

Nick had wanted to take his time on the date. He'd wanted to experience the joy of a leisurely meal without being interrupted by an calls from the station so he'd taken two days off, to allow them time. Uninterrupted opportunity to go wherever the rhythm of undisturbed time together led them. The detective takes in the living room, absent the blutbad's presence. The weight of the absence settles on his shoulders.

Riding the edge of the couch as the forensic eisbiber continues his work in the kitchen, the grimm tries to sort through the most recent conversations with Monroe for a reason the wesen has stood him up. Two things make the wesen crazy. His family and Angelina. Nick doesn't think Monroe would go off with or for his family and not at least text. He would more than likely need Nick to talk him down a little before doing anything. The traditional blutbads make their weider blutbad son see red. It wouldn't be the first time Nick had been the cooler head in a situation like that for him. But Angelina...when Nick broke up with Juliette he'd simply told the blutbad that she had moved out and that was pretty much the sum total of the breakup discussion. Monroe has said even less about Angelina except to shudder and shake his head. Nick knows some of that has to do with what happened to her brother Hap, but the rest of it...If she was in town again, he feels confident the blutbad would tell him, but it might be days. A lost weekend kind of situation because that's the kind of effect she has on his friend.

The grimm isn't sure what kind of feeling to have about that possibility. Angelina is a known commodity with predictable felonious behavior. He's sure a check of wants and warrants would give him enough to put out an APB on her, but that might get Monroe arrested, get him in the system if he's with her. That's the problem with Angelina. A rueful smile flits across the Detective's face as he glances around Monroe's 'everything in its place' living room. There is no love lost between the grimm and the female blutbad. That's no secret, that's on record. She is messy and destructive. The opposite of Monroe, just like he is. Momentary breathlessness steals over the grimm. “Wow, that's different,” he mutters under his breath. Standing up, he tries to shake off the sudden icy dread that something he's barely had the chance to embrace has been irrevocably taken from him.

Hank is also a known commodity. “Partner, it's me. I need you to do a last known and wants and warrants on Angelina Lasser.”

“You think she's into something with that guy.”

Nick wanders into Monroe's kitchen, watches as the forensic eisbiber packs up his gear. Takes a moment to let the sudden anger Hank's innocent question spark wash over and through him. The possibility that Monroe and Angelina might be mixed up in something together spoken outside his head makes Nick want to hurt Angelina, but he manages to keep that out of his voice. Keeps it nonchalant.

“Yeah. I don't know what it is yet, may be nothing I just need the rundown. Text me.” When he ends the call, he finds the eisbiber hovering at his elbow. The preliminary is essentially what the grimm expected. No other blood, not much of anything else beyond what you would expect to find in a domestic kitchen. “I'll get back to you as soon as I can with the DNA on the blood.”

Alone in the blutbad's house once more, the silence takes on a different character. Ominous. The grimm sinks down into the couch which has comforted and lulled him to sleep on more than one occasion. For the moment, there isn't anything for the detective to do except wait. Wait to verify what he already knows about the blood, wait for Monroe to call or come home.

 

§§§§§§

The grimm wakes from a fitful, dreamless sleep to darkness. _Monroe_ , he whispers into the emptiness as he immediately gains his bearings. Even as the name falls out of his mouth, he knows there will be no response. If Monroe had been home the signs would already be evident in the grimm's shoes having been removed, his body warmed by the patchwork quilt Nick had come to think of as his and the echo of long fingers smoothing his hair. Instead, the detective shivers and lowers his still shoe clad feet to the carpet.

The first text on his phone is both good news and bad news as is the second. The first, Angelina Lasser is in lock up in Oregon on an outstanding warrant. According to the date in Hank's text, the female blutbad's been in custody for two weeks. It's conceivable that she might have made Monroe her one phone call, but two weeks...He doesn't think that Monroe would have been able to keep that under wraps from him for that long. If Lasser had called for him, Monroe would have gone to her two weeks ago. Or run whatever shady errand she requested. A tiny trickle of relief wends its way through the detective, relief that the female blutbad most likely has no part of whatever's going on. Unfortunately, it also takes away a known quantity putting the grimm back at square one. The second text from the eisbiber both does and doesn't give Nick a lot to work with. The results are inconclusive as blutbaden, but does contain a marker that shows it as wesen. The eisbiber's apologies for not being able to identify whether the blood belongs to the blutbad takes up much of the text. The results don't surprise Nick. Monroe's fastidiousness is such a part of him that he would a) never have touched the doorknob with blood on his hand, b) not let it stay there for longer than a second. The detective sighs, dials the blutbad's cell again, not because he expects an answer, but to hear the blutbad's voice. As the message plays out, Nick makes a decision.

 

§§§§§§

Detective Burkhardt nurses a shot of something he ordered by rote and would be hard pressed to say what it was if asked. It mostly tastes like ashes. The detective and his partner have been to this bar on a couple of official business occasions. On the seedier side of town, it draws a mixed crowd of human and wesen lowlifes and offers very little in the way of ambiance. The patrons come to play pool, get drunk and plot acts of mayhem. Although he hasn't quite decided if he's at the bar as Detective Burkhardt, a grimm or something in the middle, he feels certain he won't get out of the bar without some mayhem of his own. It's been two hours since his date was supposed to start.

Nick eyes up the crowd for the usual snitches. It's sparse, but about right for a weeknight. As he watches the underbelly laughing, bullshitting, anger roils through the Nick. He tries not to, but he can see in his mind's eye he and Monroe at the restaurant. Monroe, giddy and glowing looking at the menu. Nick happy and proud for having been able to finagle them into the restaurant. Happy to let Monroe choose things from the menu he would never choose on his own, happy to listen to Monroe talk about his most recent clock repairs, music and his childhood. Happy for the opportunity to stare unabashedly at his sweater vested date, make his intentions unmistakable. But that's not how his evening went down and he can't help, but resent each tinkle of laughter he hears, each click of the pool cue and the steady murmur of conversation.

The detective takes another sip of ash. The anger roils through him in a way that makes Nick glad he left his service revolver in the car. It doesn't mean he isn't well armed, or heavily armed. His other weapons require a little more finesse and thought so he's less likely to kill someone in a fit of rage, but...the itch is there. There are eyes on him. Have been since he walked in of course, but now he can feel it. Something heavy. He shifts on the stool to look at a part of the room that's out of his direct eyeline. As he does the blutbad at the pool table lets his gaze linger just long enough to let the detective see that he was looking before bending gracefully over the table to line up a shot. And then with the intention to do so barely formed in his mind, the grimm is up and at the opposite edge of the table.

“Something I can do for you detective,” the blutbad asks without looking up. It rankles. The wesen is tall, bearded like Monroe, but that's where the similarities end. Monroe's sandy hair and professorial air replaced with shiny, jet black hair, leather jacket and apparently he's actually wearing chaps over his jeans. Nick rolls his eyes at the cliché, thinks about punching him on general principle.

“You know who I am?” The blutbad makes the corner pocket, straightens to his full height and gives Nick a leering up and down. “Don't be modest Detective. Very few in here don't know who you are, one way or another. ” The blutbad smirks and Nick clenches his fist against his thigh, tries to modulate all the emotion from his voice. “Where is he?”

  
“Who?”

  
“Don't _fuck_ with me.” The other blutbad smiles, straightens again focusing sharp, predatory eyes that flicker red at the detective. “Right verb, wrong application.” And just like moving from the bar to the pool table, Nick is no longer on the opposite side of the pool table. Like lightening he's on the leather jacketed blutbad with an unsheathed dagger from his aunt's weapons collection, pressed against the wesen's kidneys.

  
“I will gut you. NOW WHERE IS HE? YOU TELL ME RIGHT NOW. WHAT DID YOU DO?”

Flashing red eyes and growling greet his demand, “Like it rough do you detective?” Then Nick feels the unmistakable shape of a shotgun barrel at his temple.

“I don't say nothing about you being here 'cause as long as you're drinkin' your money's good. You stopped drinkin'.” The detective presses the knife in a little more, spares a quick glance at the bartender brandishing the shotgun. He has no friends in this room. He knew that coming in. The probable cause line he's walking is slim to none. The anger's supercedes everything and he's lost whatever slim advantage he might have had.

“You're interfering in police business.”

“You drink on the job grimm,” the dark blutbad mouths off. The grimm lessens the press of the knife a little. His primary option now is a strategic retreat. He flashes a widows and orphans smile, hoping that'll buy him the few seconds to cover the distance to the exit. The assembled more than likely don't want to do anything to get his colleagues involved any more than he does.

“Bad day. You know how it goes.”

“Yeah, I do. Somebody needs to get laid.” The blutbad straightens, and giving Nick another predatory once over. The attention makes an involuntary shiver run through his body. The anger notches up just that much more. It's a near thing Nick doesn't gut the asshole anyway.

Later in Monroe's driveway, Nick presses his head against the steering wheel as he tries to gear himself up to go inside his friend's house. In addition to the voicemails and texts, the grimm had left a note on the windshield of Monroe's car. Before he'd even pulled fully into the driveway, he could see that the note was right where he'd left it. The white slip of paper fluttered forlornly in the night air. Without his permission the voice of the other blutbad insinuates itself into Nick's consciousness, “Someone needs to get laid.” And that brings sudden, vivid, unwelcome images of Angelina naked, writhing on top of Monroe. The blutbad's hands stroking her breasts, between her legs.

The images cause physical pain to lodge in the grimm's chest. His breathing becomes sort, shallow. His mind does eventually do him the kindness of whittling its focus to Monroe. The day's fatigue is just enough. He's distraught enough to let slip the reins he keeps on some of his more explicit thoughts about his friend. Nick loses himself for a few moments in the imagined feel of the scratch of Monroe's beard against his nipples. His hand presses into the crotch of his jeans to palm his burgeoning erection. His mind helpfully supplies the image of Monroe's mouth engulfing him. An anguished moan fills the grimm's car. Before he can reach any kind of completion, he snatches his hand way. Monroe could be dead and he's beating off in his head. Shame floods in to crowd out the arousal.

 

§§§§§§

Hank's voice comes to him as if from a great distance. Nick, _Nick_ what the hell? Then he's on his ass. The fog clears in time for him to see the perp take off down the alley. He assumes it's a perp. The last minute or so is kind of blank except for the sensation of being enraged. He blinks up at his partner who stares at him like he has never seen him before. Nick's right hand aches and he looks down to see the skin on his knuckles are bleeding. Hank grabs him roughly by the upper arm to drag him up and out of the alley. The silence from Hank's side of the car is nearly deafening. They drive for about ten minutes before Hank pulls into the parking lot of one of the coffee shops they sometimes hit up after a late late night or early morning. At the moment it's mostly empty of patrons. Nick follows Hank in quietly, lets the other man order for them without saying anything.

Once the waitress brings their coffee, Hank takes one sip before leveling a look at him that the grimm has never seen before. It's an odd mix of profound disappointment, anger and concern. “You haven't been right since your C.I. went AWOL. Before we walk out of here, you're going to tell me exactly what's going on, or...I'll write you up for what just happened.”

  
It had come back to the grimm in the car. He'd seen one of the more notorious neighborhood snitches while they were canvassing the area on another case. He'd peeled away from Hank to ask the snitch about Monroe when the man had taken off running. His speed hadn't been much of a match for Nick. The man's protests that he didn't know anything, hadn't heard anything were met with Nick's fist. Repeatedly.

He opens his mouth to tell Hank a story that has nothing to do with the truth,”Monroe and I,” and finds that he can't. He can't deny the large part Monroe has played in his life for the better part of a year. He can't let Hank go on thinking that Monroe is some kind of weirdo pedophile in the making. So he opens his mouth again, “After we solved that case,” and it all comes out. Everything, Aunt Marie, reapers, wesen, blutbads, Monroe. He doesn't stop talking until it's done. And though his coffee is long cold, he picks up his cup and sips instead of looking at his partner. “You're in love with him,” Hank says quietly. “No, we hadn't, I mean we weren't -.” Nick's hand tightens around his cup.

“If you were any more sprung you'd be me with my first wife. The marriage didn't work, doesn't mean she wasn't the one. Isn't the one. I really loved her. I think with the other three was just trying to get some of that back in whatever way I could.” Nick's eyes flick up to look at his partner. Hank generally makes jokes abut the fact he's been married multiple times. This is the first time Nick can remember him speaking seriously about any of his wives. He thinks it might be the first time he's spoken of any of them as individuals. Nick's not even sure he knows what the first wife's name is. Hank meets his gaze, pins him with it.

"I _know_ what it sounds like, I _know_ what it looks like partner.”

Hank's observations settle in Nick like the truth that they are. Before Monroe disappeared, he was the first person Nick thought of in the morning and generally the last person he saw at night. If they hadn't already met up or talked at some point in the day, he'd drop by Monroe's house and had fallen asleep on his couch on more than one occasion. There was also a time or two in the last two months they'd shared a bed, but that was a result of some epic drunkeness. And nothing beyond sleeping had happened. After all that he's confessed to Hank there's no denying this, the most important thing, but Monroe should be the one who hears it from him first.

“What am I gonna do? It's been a week.” Nick tries not to hear the smallness of his own voice. For the tiniest of moments, he wishes he were a civilian, then he could delude himself about what well more than forty-eight hours with no real leads means. But if he were a civilian, he wouldn't have the resources to kill whoever has taken Monroe and hide the body so it will never be found. And that's what he's going to do.

“First,” Hank continues still quiet, “no more lies. I'm your partner. I got your back. Second, go home, _not_ to his place.” Hank pins him with another _I know_ look. “To yours, do something about your knuckles. They're like waving a flag in front of a bull. You don't want Renard on your ass.”

Nick looks at the scraped, bruised knuckles on his right hand. Hank is right. You don't have to have a particularly trained eye, to see that he's been in a fight. On his left hand the skin is actually split open on a couple of knuckles, he'd blotted the blood with a napkin when he first sat down, but yeah the 'conversations' he's had with uncooperative wesen and others over the last few days is spelled out on his fist.

“Maybe that's what I should do, take time off. Take leave.”

Hank throws a fierce scowl at him. “And do what, spend your time going off the deep end, getting down in the gutter to find answers? Doing that kind of shit like in the alley? So that when your boyfriend comes back, you've lost your badge and you're up on charges for violations under color of authority No. Monroe's a...what did you say? Something, like a wolf right?”

“A blutbad, yeah.”

“So he's tough right? Tougher than a human maybe, good instincts, better able to look out for himself.”  
It takes Nick a moment to refocus after the word boyfriend falls out of Hank's mouth so effortlessly. He appreciates what Hank's doing. And there isn't anything he's saying that isn't right. It shifts Nick's mind out of the fear, for Monroe his friend, to thinking of the _blutbad_ that survived in the wesen and human worlds long before Nick came into the picture. The blutbad who saved Nick's ass on more than one occasion. The blutbad is strong, fierce, a survivor. For the first time in the six days since Monroe went missing, Nick doesn't feel the panic that's been an undercurrent every day since. If Hank hadn't pulled him off of the guy in the alley, Nick isn't sure he would have stopped on his own.

“Go home Nick. If you have leads I can run down for you I will. But you need to take a timeout. Get your shit together.”

Given the situation, Nick figures it's okay to split the difference. He can take a little bit of a step back, but he can't do it at his own house. That idea is a non-starter, but there's no reason Hank needs to know. So he parks his car in Monroe's driveway the way he has every night for the past week. Hank's words echo in the detective's ear as he uses his key to unlock Monroe's front door. Bracing against the emptiness that assails him as soon as he steps over the threshold, Nick calls out, _Monroe_ , even though he knows there won't be any answer. Like staying at the house, it's another thing that he can't not do. Nick takes the stairs two at a time to the upstairs bathroom. And like calling out for Monroe, Nick can't help but peek into the bedroom just to make sure Monroe hasn't come back and fallen asleep in his own bed.

With his freshly neosporined knuckles, Nick settles onto the couch. Sleep has been elusive since his friend's disappearance. His dreams have turned to a nightmarish combination of the things that they've actually done together and the kinds of things that were probably on the horizon before Monroe disappeared. They always began so benign. He is leaning against the kitchen entryway, beer in hand, the way he has on numerous occasions watching Monroe concoct a meal as he does a play by play. Everything is always so vivid in the dreams. The rich smells of whatever thing the wieder blutbad had chosen to cook which often consisted of things Nick had both never heard of and would never buy at the grocery store. He didn't even think his grocery store sold most of the ingredients Monroe used. In his head, Nick had started thinking of that moment of their day as the 'hi honey, I'm home' moment. Even if he went to his own house at the end of the meal. But in his dreams, in his dream that week, that innocent part of his day, one of the best parts of his day had turned against him.

The first time Nick hadn't really realized he'd dozed off. Monroe was talking to him about... the conversation had been a steady, but indistinct buzz in his ears. Of their own volition, Nick's eyes had trailed from his friend's mouth down to the ridiculous sunburst yellow full apron wrapped around his naked body. More skin than he'd ever seen from the blutbad and it should have registered then that he'd fallen asleep. Instead, he'd been transfixed by the firm curve of his friend's ass just below the apron's tie at the small of his back. His fingers tingled to smooth across the soft looking skin. Indistinct conversation still in the grimm's ear, Monroe shifted, drawing the grimm's eyes away from his ass to the front of the apron displaced by the jut of an erection. The tingle in his fingers had become stronger, his own arousal a sudden pressure against the fly of his jeans. The blutbad had turned away from the stove a moment to smile bright and warm at the grimm. It's the straw that broke his hesitation. Just as he reached to touch the blutbad, the grimm had jerked into consciousness on the couch. Painfully aroused. Alone. Devastated.

 

§§§§§§

The diner near his house is old school, but in an effort to compete with Starbucks they've added a sort of express line for customers to order their morning fix. It's the line Nick is standing in, waiting his turn after another night plagued by dreams of what might have been, when he sees a familiar face. It takes him a moment because the context is all wrong.

Before, his demeanor was asshole douchebag through and through, but when their eyes meet across the coffee shop, the leather jacketed blutbad looks straight up guilty. It fills up the distance between them. It roils off him like a bad odor. Just like the night at the bar, Nick is after him before he's even fully aware of it. This time there is no one with a shotgun to stop him. The startled exclamations of the other patrons barely registers as he chases the blutbad into the alley behind the shop. The pump of adrenaline, the sheer certainty that this blutbad knows something disengages everything but the most brutal instincts in Nick. He pulls his weapon and shoots the fleeing blutbad two quick pops in the leg. With a scream the wesen falls, partially woges. Nick advances, gun aimed at the blutbad's head. Before the blutbad can pull himself up, the grimm hits him in his lower back with the butt of his gun. The pained shriek satisfies something deep and primitive in the grimm. Nick rolls the wesen onto his back, sits on his injured leg and points his gun at his head.

“Where is he? I know you know something. I saw it in your eyes. Where is he?”

“I don't know what you're talking about, grimm.” the blutbad snarls and gasps, but it's there again. It reads like fear, but not fear of the man that just shot him, that knows enough to hit him on the weak spot on his back. Nick cracks him across the face with the gun butt. Moves up to straddle the blutbad's chest. “I will kill you. Whoever is making you hold your tongue,” the grimm rears back and punches the blutbad, “they have nothing on me. I will kill you and leave you in this alley for the reinigen. Maybe the bauerschwein would like a shot at your corpse.”

“That's a low blow grimm.”

  
Sirens in the distance signal the grimm he is running out of time. He chambers a round, presses the muzzle to the blutbad's head.

“Okay, okay look. I'm a lover not a fighter. Come on now. So you know I had to get out of there. And that shit was most likely rigged six ways to Sunday so...” The sirens are getting closer.

“Tell me now.” The blutbad does tell him in a quick spew of a major player's name and a location. It's true that the blutbad doesn't know where Monroe is exactly, but his hunch is a good one. So good that a kind of calm settles over Nick for the first time in days as he holsters his weapon and bolts for his car, well before uniforms swarm the alley in response to a call of shots fired. It crosses his mind briefly that there may have been cameras in the alley, but he's finally got a solid lead. He's going to get Monroe and nothing else truly registers.

Just enough clarity still exists in his grimm and cop aspects that he does call Hank. That decision proves to be fortuitous. When the grimm arrives at the location given to him by the other blutbad a part of him immediately turns to ice. There's a bag in his trunk stocked to the gills with ancient lethal weapons. Re-stocked shortly after Monroe's disappearance. He understands that he'll have to move fast so he grabs only the lightest, sharpest of knives, secrets them on his body. He prefers the glock. Wishes he could go all firepower to just mow down those standing between him and his friend. But stealth will be important and if Monroe is able, Nick would rather hand him a pointy knife than a loaded gun.

Fortunately there are only two wesen guarding what looks to be a long metal shed and both of them are easily dispatched with a dagger through the heart and a slit throat. He kills two more guards that he only takes a moment to consider might have been human before he finds the right part of the warehouse. It takes him a moment to process what he's seeing, the lines of cages too small for a anyone to really stand up in, arranged one after the other on the floor. His mind tries to reject out of hand that any of the huddled creatures could be Monroe. The stench and the wails and whimpers of misery nearly overwhelm him. But there is no time for his feelings. “Monroe, Monroe,” he calls and keeps calling until one of the wails resolves itself into a word he can understand, into his name said over and over broken and faltering.

The grimm drops to his knees beside the cage that is entirely too small to contain a full grown man. Huddled close to the bars naked and dirty, Monroe sticks his finger through the bars. Nick catches them and holds on. “I'm here honey. I'm here.” Around him the other caged wesen howl and moan in distress. The grimm only has eyes and ears for _his_ wesen. A sort of padlock secures the cage. It's of no consequence to the grimm. Retrieving a small knife secreted in an inner pocket of his shirt, he sets about making quick work of the lock. It's a two hand job, but now that he's made contact with Monroe, he can't bring himself to pull his other hand away from his wesen. The grimm smooths his hand through his friend's greasy, matted hair. “We're almost there, I just have to get the lock. Just a few more seconds.” The chop of helicopter blades overhead signals the grimm he may have less time than he hoped to get Monroe to safety.

 

§§§§§§

Nick,” his name is called softly , but the grirmm wakes instantly. From the hospital bed, Monroe blinks at him once, twice and the grimm goes to his side immediately. “Are you in pain?" He reaches toward the machine by the bed that manages the pain medication.

“I feel like I've been run over by a horde of siegbarste.” Nick pushes the button once. It's the first time Monroe has been conscious since his surgery. He'd been worked over pretty good. There hadn't been a chance yet to find out if that was from the illegal cage matches or from coercion to participate in the fighting. Were he not wesen, he'd be dead as would many of the others that had been rescued when Hank got to the warehouse with reinforcements. The thought of either scenario causes a murderous rage to lick at his heels. He tamps it down as best he can. He has Monroe now. Stroking his hand through the blutbad's now clean, unmatted hair, the blutbad responds,,“I'm totally prepared to give you a raincheck on the date if you want, but -”

“The date was your idea. I'd have let you take me anytime you wanted on the living room floor, but I didn't want you to think badly of me.” That elicits a growl from Nick as his hands tighten in Monroe's hair. He takes what he's able to in the moment. He lays siege to his friend's mouth. The grimm knows it's too much too soon, but all those days when he didn't know where his friend was propel him. He can't let another moment pass without Monroe _knowing_. Although his lips are a little chapped, there was remarkably no damage to the blutbad's face, his mouth offers a homecoming and a peace Nick has never experienced before.

“Easy tiger, I'm not exactly at one hundred percent,” the blutbad murmurs as the grimm eases off, comes back to himself and slips his hands down to rest on the railing on the side of the blutbad's bed. “I'm in love with you,” Nick says simply. “I need you to know.” He presses his forehead as gently as he can to his friend's.

“I know. I knew that you would come for me.” In the next breath Monroe is out like a light. The grimm gently traces the outline of the blutbad's features before he places a soft kiss on the sleep slackened mouth. When he steps out of the room, he finds Hank waiting for him with a cup of coffee and an understanding smile.

“Thank you,” Nick says as he accepts the coffee. They both know even though it's been almost twelve hours from the time they got the tip on Monroe's possible whereabouts, to the takedown of the warehouse, to this moment, that Nick's gratitude isn't just about the coffee.

Hank just shrugs. “We all need talked off the ledge, sometimes. So?”

“So. They want to keep him here for a few more days. Two story house, he's gonna need some help until the cast comes off. And I need to be with him.” Hank just nods to him and extends his hand.

“Whatever I can do.”

“I'm sorry,” Nick replies solemnly and he shakes his partner's hand.

“About what man?”

“About Nadine.”

Nick wonders if anyone has ever said that to Hank about his marriage, about losing the love of his life or if his partner started deflecting with humor right away, never really ever allowing anyone the chance. Hank's expression flickers. He wants Hank to know the truth, know that he doesn't have to keep that facade up for Nick. He also deserves all of the truth from this point forward.

  
“Even with grimm business in the mix, if we hadn't found him...if he had died, I wouldn't have...I would have burned it all down Hank. I would have burned everything to the ground. By vocation, by calling I'm willing to die, but for him, for him I'd kill. Did kill.”

That's the answer to Hank's statement in the diner a week ago. Yes, he's in love with Monroe and it's done kind of a number on his psyche. Hank should know just what he's dealing with. There are going to be changes. He won't be re-adopting the kill all wesen modus operandi of his ancestors, but the blanket benevolence until something happens is over. It's that benevolence and his equanimity that allowed some to think it was okay to withhold information, to stall and play games. The scope of Taymor's operation attests to how much info was available to be had. The games were something he should have had a line on long before Monroe disappeared.

His not killing wesen on sight has allowed some in the community to live with a false security, has maybe left a perception of weakness. Now sides will have to be chosen. Straight up. The community either works with him unequivocally or those who don't will face immediate and deadly consequences. No shades of gray. It's just the way it is now. He's all out of leeway. Something like this will never be permitted to happen to Monroe again. He doesn't lay those specifics out for Hank, but the look his partner gives him before nodding at him again before he turns to go lets Nick know Hank will continue to have his back.

In the four days before Monroe is allowed to come home, the grimm visits some of the more nefarious bars in town to lay down the law. If a couple of wesen bar owners go missing, if a couple of the establishments end up mysteriously burned to the ground that is simply the way of the city now. Sitting on the hood of his car, a safe distance away watching flames lick the night sky, Nick hadn't felt anything but righteous anger move him. The no nonsense grimming in those four days bought him time, time to completely focus on Monroe's recovery. A blessing and a curse.

The grimm wakes with a start. He's on the couch again. His heart hammers in his chest as panic starts to thread through him. He clutches the quilt covering him and his heart rate slows. Nick is covered in a heavy blutbad marriage quilt that belonged to Monroe's great, great grandparents. The first night they shared a bed, Monroe told him where to get fresh sheets and he pulled a quilt out of the cedar chest at the foot of his bed. He'd explained the squares depicted the history of Monroe's family and that it had been passed to him as the eldest at puberty. As he'd passed it to Nick to put on the bed, he'd said quietly, “When I became a weider blutbad, I never thought I'd actually get to use it, though this is probably not what my family envisioned.” Nick inhales. The quilt smells like the both of them. It smells like security and home. The panic recedes.

Nick slips into the bedroom he shares with Monroe and tries to strip down quietly, but Monroe rolls over onto his back anyway and watches him in the dark.

“You didn't wake me up?”

“You were sleeping pretty soundly.” Monroe mumbles in a sleepy burr, laced with concern, before the blutbad turns his back leaving the space for Nick to slot into his usual place. Naked, the grimm slips into bed flush against Monroe's naked back. Against the sleep warm body, he nestles his knee between his boyfriend's, snakes his arm over a fleshy hip to tangle lightly in the hair just below his navel. He presses a kiss against the blutbad's temple. He's grateful for the concern. Grateful that his wesen is willing to put up with him. He doubts when Monroe imagined them together, it included this. This hypervigilance. Since the kidnapping, he can't actually relax. Can't stop looking for boogeymen. Yes boogeymen do exist and yes his job is to deal with them, but this is not that. This is him, after Monroe was medically cleared to be on his own, at first not being able to actually go back to work. The idea that Monroe would be farther away from him than five minutes at the most made it impossible for him to step outside their home without the blutbad. He let two scheduled return dates pass before Renard called him and threatened to fire him.

During the first weeks of Monroe's recovery, the wesen had rarely been out of his sight. He couldn't navigate the stairs on his own so Nick had to help him up and down and in the beginning they didn't do that very often so mostly it was just the two of them hunkered down on the couch. Nick had attempted to cook the kind of meals that Monroe liked, with the wesen trying to talk him through it. Quinoa pancakes and tofu lasagna were never going to be the grimm's strong suits. After a day of wreaking total havoc in the kitchen and watching Monroe trying not to let his horror show, Nick had arranged for daily delivery of the wesen's favorite sandwich, roasted portobello mushroom from his favorite neighborhood market.

He even managed to overcome flashbacks from the night Monroe was kidnapped enough to have food delivered from RFD. Hank had also helped by bringing food when he stopped to check in and keep Nick updated on ongoing cases and cases that might have had wesen involvement. Overall the grimm was proud to have spared Monroe's kitchen further damage and to have kept the wesen properly fed, but the food deliveries had eliminated a major reason for Nick to leave the blutbad alone for any significant amount of time. When he wasn't focused on keeping the blutbad properly fed, he'd turned his attention to the blutbad's pleasure. In the first few days home from the hospital, there'd been a lot of touching for reassurance, from both of them. Because the mobility issues kept Monroe mostly on the couch the first week he was home, he rarely missed an opportunity to, when the grimm passed within distance, to stroke a finger against his hand, entangle their fingers together or lightly squeeze his wrist. Likewise the grimm would find himself reaching to stroke his hand up into the blutbad's hair or caress the skin at the nape of his neck as he went from kitchen to living room to upstairs. The second week he'd bumped things up considerably.

The medication they'd given Monroe to help with the pain, help him sleep didn't seem to work particularly well with the blutbad's metabolism. They tried a couple of apothecary concoctions, but at the end of the day what worked best were Nick's hands on him. Nick's mouth on him. The first time started innocently enough. Nick had made a vow to himself, in spite of the blutbad's confession in the hospital, that he would take things slowly. His staying with the blutbad was a matter of necessity despite everything else there was. He didn't want to take advantage, but he'd caught his friend trying to hide a grimace. “What is it?”

“I'm okay.” The blutbad had attempted to flash Nick a smile, but it faltered badly. Sitting gingerly on the couch next to him, Nick had stroked his fingers through the blutbad's hair which seemed to soothe. And the grimm had just kept going, caressing down the blutbad's neck, across his chest, lingering just a little on his nipples as the tension ebbed out of the wesen. It was working so well that it never occurred to Nick to stop as he got to the waistband of the blutbad's pajamas.

 _“Oh, Nick”_ , the blutbad moaned softly as the grimm learned the heft and weight of him. Already half hard from finally being able to touch Monroe in the way he had in the nightmares that tortured him, the mood had exploded into fully sexual and a spill of anguished words _“God, Monroe. Please. I need, I don't know what -,”_ Monroe had cut off the words by nipping his way into the grimm's mouth as Nick worked a rhythm according to the changing intensity of Monroe's kiss. After the blutbad came all over his hand, the grimm had opened his jeans and jacked himself while Monroe mouthed his neck. They'd fallen asleep on the couch together.

For a few minutes after his boss' call he'd considered what life would be if he walked away from the police department, but the access alone, the cover it gave for grimm business and the backup he could rely on helped motivate him out of the door. That first day back he'd procrastinated. not showing up until after lunch. Monroe had driven him and that made things a little easier. Twenty minutes after sitting down at his desk for the first time in almost three months, he called Monroe to make sure he'd gotten back to the house okay. Even as he dialed, a voice in the back of his mind told him it was too soon. Maybe too much. “Hey Nick,” Monroe had answered on the first ring and there had been nothing but a smile in his voice.

It was maybe a testament to how good they were together that Monroe picked up on what was happening and took it out of Nick's hands without making him feel more unhinged. Monroe sent him texts and pictures during his shift, pictures of the insides of clocks he was working on, random wesen factoids, inappropriate skin. Once he'd texted a picture of his puckered nipple. Nick spit a fair amount of his coffee onto the dash. Hank just rolled his eyes and kept driving. Because they'd become intimate the same thing might have been happening anyway, stupid random texting and pictures and the desperate itch to maintain the connection when they were separated by Nick's shift. It wasn't like they hadn't been in close contact before. But Nick thinks the fine line of desperation that runs through him and the prickle of panic he works actively to fight down when he is more than a few minutes from Monroe would be absent. There's worry where there wasn't any before. So Monroe had taken over the task of keeping them connected, effortlessly.

Nick tightens his grip on the blutbad in his arms, presses his mouth against the nape of Monroe's neck as he murmurs _I love you, I love you, I love you_ like a sort of protective incantation. Worries at bay for the moment, the grimm tries to go back to sleep.

Fin


End file.
